[loisba]

Twice now I've gotten gluten_type symptoms after eating sausage. Each time there was something else in the meal that COULD have been the culprit. The first time was at a restaurant, when I had sausages, the kind that come in casings, corn, green beans, and a salad with salad dressing. The two things I suspected were the sausages, and the salad dressing. The salad dressing was actually more like a shrimp cocktail type sauce, sort of ketchupey with horseradish in it.
The second time was yesterday, when all day I ate on a dish I made of rice and sausage. The sausage was from a pig my son had processed locally, so there were no ingredients listed on the package. I wondered if wheat might have been used in the herbs and spices added to the pork. But I also ate chocolate mints, which I don't think would have had flour. The diarrhea could have come from the mints, since I can't eat too many sweets, but I don't think the gas and bloating would have been from the candy.
Hence the question: In your experience, can sausage contain wheat?

[NancyM]

Restaurants are VERY tricky. Even if there was nothing in your salad that contained wheat you might have gotten cross contamination from something else. You might want to look into the Triumph Dining cards, or something similar. They describe to the chef/wait-staff what you have to avoid in terms they can understand. It really makes eating out a lot easier. Usually they take the card back to the cooks then come out and say what, if anything, I can order off their menu. But without being able to check the ingredient list yourself, you can't 100% rule out that you're not getting wheat.

Could your chocolate mints have been sweetened using something other than sugar? Some artificial sweeteners will give most people terrible gas and/or diarrhea.

[aklap]

A Public Service Announcement from the Gluten Police:

"All foods are guilty until proven innocent!"


Gluten is found in places you don't even expect it. Just ask me about Twizzlers

Like Nancy said - restaurants are very risky. You might consider getting yourself on stable ground before trying to venture out to a restaurant. There are some people that will not eat out period! They will not risk getting glutened.

When the time comes, pick 1 or 2 places that you know, trust and can work with to try to provide you with a safe meal. Call ahead and try to meet with the manager or the head chef. Do this on off hours [before they start serving, or way way way off peak times]. I'd even do this without planning on eating that particular visit. You are there for a fact finding mission to see how and if they can accommodate you. Even places that have GF Menus (ie Outback Steakhouse, do not have standardized training on GF food handling), need to be educated. If you are lucky, you'll find a place that is familiar with GF food safe practices.

[loisba]

Thanks for the replies. I'm starting to learn that it's dificult to eat out!
I noticed that neither of you mentioned the sausage. Does that mean that sausage is always gluten free?
Sorry to be so persnickety, but I really do like sausage, and if I can blame this on something else, I will, but if the sausage was probably the culprit, I will give it up! Except when I can check the ingredients!

[aklap]

Some sausage is GF, some is not. It depends on the brand or the processing. The only way to know is to call the place that made it. In your case...you'd have to call the meat market that processed your son's sausage. You not only have to ask about wheat, but also barley, rye & oats.

For instance...many Johnsonville products are GF (not the beer brats tho)

http://www.johnsonville.com/siteconf...ENFREEPRODUCTS

[NancyM]

You can't really say whether or not sausage is gluten free without seeing the ingredient list, so I didn't even try. Even if they don't add wheat, perhaps they've put soy sauce or something in it that contains wheat. Personally if someone can't verify the ingredients for me, I have to think twice about eating it.

[loisba]

Thanks, all. That pretty well addresses my question about sausage. I'm going to assume that the sausage my son has stored out in my freezer contains gluten.
As for the restaurant where I ate the other sausage, the reason I like to eat there is because it is a buffet. I get carry-out, which turns out very cheap for me, since they charge according to the weight. I can usually eat for 2 or 3 bucks! I'll just be sure to limit myself to the veggies and salad, and take my own salad dressing. And they usually have baked potatoes, with sour cream and butter on the side. That should be OK!
Now I just have to figure out what to get at the Mexican restaurant. We eat there once a week, and I did check the ingredients in their corn tortillas. I've been ordering rice and beans (cheap, again! ), and I always eat a few of the chips and salsa. But something there has been bothering me. I guess I'll cut out the chips, and get a salad, and the tortillas. I explained to the owner's wife about the need for gluten free food, and she brought out the package of corn tortillas for me to check the ingredients. But since I didn't specifically ask her about the other dishes, I doubt if it would have occured to her to mention if flour were used in them. As it was, she looked at me as if I needed to have my head examined!
Thanks,

[NancyM]

They use soy sauce in a lot of the marinades in Mexican cooking these days. :\ So you do need to be careful. Again, those dining cards are fantastic, I really recommend looking into them. They usually have them bilingual too, so if you're eating at a Thai restaurant it is in Thai/English.

Another thing to be aware of is a lot of times they fry wheat things and non-wheat things in the same oil.

The ways for cross contamination to happen in buffets is pretty endless. Someone could knock some wheat into a dish, use a spoon that was just in a wheat based dish, accidently dribble crumbs from bread. I remember one waitress on another gluten free web site saying how they're always getting crumbs from croutons mixed into the other salad ingredients, because they're rushing and food is flying everywhere.

[KimS]

I would absolutely not eat food from a buffet... ever!! The risk of cross contamination is just too great.

Sorry to bring news that I'm sure you don't want to hear.

The good news is that you can make your own buffet at home and be sure that you won't get sick!

[mrsD]

I think sausage is problematic anyway.

This food is filled with fat, and questionable animal by products.

I do not know about the gluten issue, since I stopped using sausages
before I went GF.

Did I tell you that canned salmon now by Chicken of the Sea has wheat
powder in it? The little tins to take to lunch, they just hit the shelves a couple of months ago. I buy the foil envelopes to take to lunch
and they don't have the wheat listed. Who needs wheat in Salmon?